In the production of so-called semiripe or semiprocessed cheeses and especially in the production of portions of cheese in which the curd is molded into the final shape in the presence of the serum and the serum or whey is simultaneously withdrawn, two systems have been found to be sufficiently practical for actual use.
Thus, there are presently employed units for molding and cutting in which the curd is molded and prepressed in the presence of serum, then cut into parallelepipedal portions, whereupon these portions are placed in molds. A primary pressing is then carried out to impart the final shape, as a rule a generally cylindrical configuration, to the cheese body. Thereafter, the cheeses are demolded and can be introduced in other molds for a final pressing operation in which they retain the cylindrical configuration.
The aforedescribed process, although currently in use, is manifestly illogical because it requires the formation of an intermediate body of parallelepipedal form in order to obtain a different configuration, almost always cylindrical. While the process can be carried out automatically in the above-described apparatus using movable or fixed bottoms for the pressing operation, there nevertheless is the disadvantage that a plurality of steps are required to obtain the final product and the irrational sequence set forth above must be followed therewith.
There are also in use devices for molding, prepressing and cutting the molded cheese curds into portions which consist essentially of an envelope in the interior of which are disposed perforated-wall molding tubes having vertical axes. These tubes permit the molding of the curd and a prepressing thereof in the presence of the serum or whey, the columns of curd being immediately provided with the circular cross section desired in the finished product. At the base of the envelope receiving the tubes, there is provided a system for severing the downwardly advanced column of curd into portions of given lengths which fall into the molds.
The second system, while obviously more rational than the first, has however numerous disadvantages. Firstly, the mixture of curd and whey or serum delivered by the gravity to the perforated tubes is separated by decantation and hence by settling of the curd from the whey only under the effect of gravity and as a result of the difference in density between the grains of the curd and the serum or whey. This difference in density is minor and decreases as the grains are more moist, so that the sedimentation time is extremely long.
To overcome this drawback, certain apparatuses of this latter type have been provided at their upper portions with fluid cylinders actuating the pressing plates which are vertically displaceable in the interiors of the several tubes to press the curd. Such cylinders, however, complicate the construction of the apparatus and render it more costly, while increasing substantially the height of the apparatus and hence the spatial requirement therefor. In addition, the results obtained with this modification are not fully satisfactory because the perforations of the tubes may be warped during operation and hence the prepressing is not uniform over the entire height of the columns of curd so that the productivity of the apparatus, the quality of the products obtained and their uniformity all leave much to be desired.